Win and Losses (4)

Long Ming quickly broke the rune in his hands, causing a small Qi barrier to appear in front of him and, in the next instant, defend Fei Lu's blow.

'Clang!' a loud sound rang out as Fei Lu's sword collided with that barrier. Long Ming was able to perceive Fei Lu's Qi more precisely at this point and instantly confirmed that his theory was correct.

'He has reached the initial stage of the Qi Collection realm,' Long Ming concluded with seriousness on his face. At that moment, Long Ming could see that Fei Lu's Qi was able to cover his entire sword-holding arm. And that was a characteristic of someone who was at the early stage of the Qi Gathering realm.

As far as Long Ming knew, progress in the Qi Collection realm was determined by the amount of Qi a cultivator had, as well as how much of this Qi he could use. In short, cultivators at the initial stage would be able to strengthen an entire limb, at the intermediate stage all the limbs, at the advanced stage almost the entire body simultaneously and finally at the peak stage the entire body simultaneously.

This revelation made Long Ming lose, even slightly, his confidence in winning this match.

It was common sense that the difference between the half-step stage and the initial stage of the Qi Gathering realm was extremely large, similar to the difference between the initial stage and the peak stage of the Body Hardening realm.

This was all thanks to the cultivator's Qi, which reaches a level capable of raising the individual's physical capabilities several times over, as well as their naturally enhanced senses and mobility.

"If it hadn't been for my resonance, as well as my superior technical skills, I would have lost right now," he quickly concluded, still looking at Fei Lu.

Whether it was the brief fight the two had at that party, or the short exchanges of blows in this duel, Long Ming could see that Fei Lu wasn't as skilled; or at least, not as skilled as Long Ming. This made him a relatively easy opponent to deal with, that is, disregarding the difference in their physical capabilities.

'My resonance will last about a minute. That's all the time I have to defeat you,' and as soon as he concluded this, he quickly advanced towards Fei Lu.

Fei Lu disdained Long Ming's attitude and prepared to attack him immediately.

Soon, the two of them approached each other in the middle of the arena, and Long Ming made a diagonal cut towards his opponent.

Fei Lu prepared to parry his blow, but just as their weapons were about to collide, Long Ming suddenly turned his twinblade and attacked on the opposite side.

Sensing the blade approaching his body, Fei Lu didn't want to defend and boldly stepped forward, reducing the distance between them even more and making a vertical cut with his sword.

Fei Lu's attack was extremely fast, as he was being strengthened by his Qi, but Long Ming instinctively avoided it and used his footwork to reach a blind spot left by this blow.

Then, using his Qi as well as the energy of nature, Long Ming began to deliver a series of extremely fast, unpredictable and unstoppable blows towards Fei Lu's blind spot.

Fei Lu hurriedly turned around, just in time to parry the first blow and dodge the second, but the third ended up hitting her shoulder, but only superficially.

Then came the fourth blow, then the fifth, the sixth and so on. In about two seconds, Long Ming had landed eleven blows and, finally, he landed one last blow which, driven by nature's energy, sent out an extremely powerful slash that sent a wave of cutting wind towards his enemy.

Fei Lu raised his sword to defend against this last attack, but even though he managed to parry Long Ming's blade, the wave of wind caused by the blow ended up cutting him, making a considerable gash in his body.

"Long Ming!" Fei Lu was at first shocked by this, then enraged, and then quickly advanced towards him.

Before Long Ming could react, Fei Lu was already a few feet away and made a diagonal slash towards him.

Long Ming didn't have time to think before hastily trying to parry with his twinblade.

'Urgh', he felt a sharp pain from the impact of Fei Lu's sword, and instantly he realized Fei Lu was about to deliver another blow.

Hastily, Long Ming broke another of the runes on his clothes, creating a small Qi barrier in front of him, just in time to defend another blow from Fei Lu.

'Clang!', a sound of metal colliding with metal rang out in the arena, a sound so loud that even the most distant civilians could hear it.

'Tsk, my blow wasn't deep enough,' Long Ming thought in disappointment. Then he noticed Fei Lu dodging the barrier and approaching from the side.

Long Ming quickly turned his body to avoid another blow, then stepped to the right to avoid another cut, then parried another cut with his blade. He proceeded in this way for the next few seconds, largely following his instincts and intuition to avoid the cuts, because at that moment Fei Lu's attacks were too fast for him to think before he acted.

Occasionally, Fei Lu's slashes passed through Long Ming's defense and made several cuts around his body, but they weren't as deep, allowing Long Ming to ignore them thanks to his adrenaline.

At some point, Long Ming took a wrong turn, briefly breaking his stance and allowing Fei Lu to attack towards his belly.

'!', Long Ming hurriedly tried to parry with his twinblade, but he was too slow and Fei Lu's sword went inches deeper into the side of his belly.

Long Ming felt a brief shortness of breath from the impact of the blow, but soon recovered and, in the next moment, counterattacked. He used his resonance to propel his attack with the energy of nature (unfortunately, he no longer had any Qi) and made a horizontal cut towards his arm.

Fei Lu, fortunately, was not in such a good state, and only managed to mobilize his Qi to defend his arm before the attack reached him. His expression distorted with pain as the twinblade's blade also entered his skin, but did not reach his muscles.

Soon after, the two of them stepped back and stared at each other for a while.

'I have ten seconds,' Long Ming thought, then analyzed his situation. In addition to the deep cut on his stomach, he also had other cuts all over his body. Although not as serious, these other cuts when accumulated made his situation serious, although not life-threatening, yet.

Worst of all, however, was that he had used up all his Qi in that sequence of attacks, emptying his entire reservoir.

He no longer had any hope of winning, in his opinion.

On the other hand, Fei Lu didn't seem to be in a better state, mainly because Long Ming's cuts were in more vital and dangerous spots, making them more serious. However, Fei Lu didn't look that tired and it was uncertain whether he still had Qi.

With all these thoughts, Long Ming began to reflect deeply and, trusting his intuition, made up his mind.

"Ahh, I give up," he said.

"What?!" the spectators exclaimed in disbelief, extremely disappointed and confused by Long Ming's decision.

"You're giving up, Long Ming? Really?", Fei Lu spoke with a frown, and obvious disappointment in his expression.

"Yes, my condition is not good at all, and if I continue I'll need a long time to recover. It's not worth it," Long Ming said casually. He spoke sincerely, at that moment, his condition was quite sensitive, and it would take some time for him to recover. Besides, he would need to leave town in two weeks' time, so he didn't have the time to spend dealing with very serious injuries.

Also, the prizes for fourth place, a low-grade yellow sword, weren't that interesting to him. As for the semi-final and final prizes, Long Ming never thought he'd get them.

"Tsk, okay then. Long Ming, keep your promise and give me back the ring," Fei Lu then said, looking menacingly at Long Mieng.

"Of course, in a few days' time I'll pay a visit to the Fei residence and give it to you," he assured him.

After this, the host announced to everyone that Fei Lu had won and the two of them left the arena. Long Ming returned to the Wu residence and went to his room to treat his injuries.

On the way, he approached a maid and asked her to bring some medicine and bandages to his room, then went into the bedroom and took a short bath.

'Ahh...', he let out a long breath as he relaxed in the cold tub. His mind was a whirlwind of thoughts, reflecting on countless things.

'I lost due to lack of cultivation...', Long Ming didn't think Fei Lu was skilled, but he was able to make up for it through Qi, as well as his superior cultivation. Of course, perhaps Fei Lu was hiding his cards up his sleeve, but if that was the case, he shouldn't have suffered so many cuts from Long Ming.

'If only I'd had a bit more Qi...' On the other hand, in retrospect, he also thought of the countless mistakes he'd made during the fight. As he thought about these mistakes, he thought that if he had acted in different ways, he could have won.

'What if I can't create my cultivation method? Is this my limit? Even if I succeed, the Lin Clan has several elders in the Foundation Establishment realm. It's not enough to create the method for the Qi Gathering realm, I also need to reach the half-step stage and? I still need to create another cultivation method, and reach the Foundation Establishment...'

Countless doubts and insecurities arose in his mind, flooding him completely. Long Ming felt his consciousness submerge into the darkness of his subconscious, where all his doubts, which he avoided thinking about at all costs, came to the surface.

'Did I really need to run away? What if I could really go on living in the village? What if I hadn't had to do all this? What if I had insisted even more that we hadn't accepted that mission?' Long Ming didn't notice the things around him as countless questions and conjectures overwhelmed his senses.

"Long Ming!" suddenly, a voice sounded from the entrance to his room. This voice snapped Long Ming out of his thoughts, so, with a long sigh, Long Ming got out of the bath and put on new clothes.

"Oh? What are you doing here, old man?" Long said, just after coming out of the bathroom wearing a casual black suit. At the entrance to his room stood Gao Ting, holding a bag in his hands.

"They said you had a pretty intense fight, brat," Gao Ting said provocatively, then entered the room and sat down on a chair.

Then Long Ming noticed two more people on the other side of the door, Wu Yuying and Wu Feng.

"Lady Wu and Elder Wu, to what do I owe the honor of your visit?" Long Ming asked rather confusedly.

"I recently left my retreat, and I heard from a maid that you ended up returning here badly injured," she said. Long Ming smiled amusedly at this answer, but kept quiet and looked at Wu Feng, waiting for him to reply.

"I saw the fight you had with that boy. You're quite talented, but I could see that you lack instruction," Wu Feng said as he stared at Long Ming. His answer confused, then surprised Long Ming.

Firstly, because Wu Feng realized that Long Ming was uneducated, but secondly, because he sensed a hidden purpose in his statement.

"Senior Wu, what do you mean by that?" Long Ming asked respectfully.

"Perhaps I can help you during your stay. You seem very talented, and our young lady seems to like you a lot, so it would be a waste not to help you," Wu Feng said, his expression as serious as ever. His response made Wu Yuying slightly embarrassed, but Long Ming completely ignored her reaction, too shocked (and overjoyed) by Wu Feng's goodwill.

"Senior Wu, I would be extremely grateful to have some lessons with you," he said, while bowing.

"First focus on treating your injuries, brat," Gao Ting suddenly spoke, then asked Long Ming to sit on his bed and took some items out of that bag.

"Senior Wu and Lady Wu, please allow Long Ming to tend to his injuries first. Then you can talk at your leisure," Gao Ting then shooed the two Wu family members out of the room and helped Long Ming tend to his injuries.

Long Ming then took some pills that were in that bag, which would heal his wounds and relieve the pain, then they both sewed up the most serious wounds and put several bandages around his body.

"Gee, don't you think that's a bit much, old man?" Long Ming asked casually, after Gao Ting had covered him almost completely with the bandages.

"Tsk, that's the bare minimum to help him heal faster," Gao Ting said, almost grumbling. Long Ming said nothing in response, just nodded briefly.

Soon after this, Wu Yuying appeared again at the entrance to the room and, with Long Ming's permission, went into the room to talk to him. Gao Ting also accompanied them, and they soon spent a long time talking about various things, mainly about Long Ming's fights and Wu Yuying's achievement.

"As expected from such a talented person, you've really reached the initial stage even though you're so young~", Long Ming said flatteringly to her, after she told him the reason for her seclusion. Of course, he had already guessed that the reason was that she felt she was about to break through, but even so, the confirmation shocked him slightly.

"It's no big deal, I've been training since I was six. So it's normal for me to break through after about twelve years of training," she said in a seemingly humble manner, but her answer left Long Ming with a bitter taste in his mouth. He didn't mind, though, and the two of them continued talking.

It was soon evening and they both said goodbye to Long Ming, allowing him to rest.

Now alone, Long Ming became completely contemplative again, so he left his room and looked up at the starry sky, with all its colors and stars.